Anti-Poverty Policies and the Adoption of Bill 112 in Quebec: A Change of Path?

Pascale Dufour

Abstract

In this paper, we address anti-poverty policies in Quebec and especially the adoption of Bill 112 in December 2002. We argue that apart from structural elements specific to the Quebec context, without the popular mobilisation initiated by the Collectif pour une loi sur l'élimination de la pauvreté, Bill 112 would not have been developed or passed into law. We show first how social actors have created a movement that changed the conditions of public action towards poverty, analysing the particular political opportunity structure of the time period (1995-2002) favourable to the Collectif and two internal dimensions of the movement: its efficient strategy, and the fact that poor people themselves were at the forefront of the mobilisation. We then argue that these changes are not equivalent for all poor persons in terms of material gains. We finish by suggesting that the most important change is cognitive. All in all, Bill 112 should be seen as an exception in the political treatment of poverty; but a moment that has only slightly changed the rules of the game and the possibilities for future state actions.